The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1887-09-15
SOUTHERN AGRICULTURAL.
Bury the Dead.

~ There is always some immediate
cause for chicken cholera which is
readily detected and may be removed
and the malady stamped& out by
prompt and energetic action. 4 for
one do not believe that because one or
two fowls die with the symptoms OF
cholera the flock should be left to its
evil fate. This is. not the custom, /
am well aware, with wide awake poul-
try fanciers, but in the country dis
tricts the idea does not seem to pre-
vail to very great extent that if few
chickens die of the disease why-'The
chickens have the cholera, and its no
use to doctor them" This is
the kind of a song 81 l
heard at several places in
Southeast Missouri last month while
there on a brief visit i remember
one place in particular where the pro-.
prIetor was showing us his flock after
having reported ga little cholera. ,"
and who in reply to our inquiry as to
what he did with those that died, stat
ed that "the bsys'' buried the most
of them. took look at the boys
little urchins aged respectively eight
and ten years-and Immediately lost
faith in that mans ability or earnest
ness as poultryman. He had some
of our fine Brown Leghorn eggs on
the shares, and the cholera was get
hot oh
talking 1 parted a cluster ofzweeds
with. a stick l carried, and was not
at all surprised to have
revealed the dead body of an old hen.
partly decomposed, polluting the air
and the SOIL The proprietor did not
appear at all surprised or shocked at
the sight, and twas within twenty five
feet of his hen-house, too. .x
Everywhere 1 found the same neg
lect of the dead. The people seemed
to attach no Importance to the neces-
sity OF. burying- the fowls that died
either from accident or disease, nor to
fear any evil results from such neg
| lect. +- fs.ef &. .s~.
|
| was indifference and neglect. The most
of the people about that little river
town (not seventy miles from St.
LOUSY who have lately begun to raise
fancy fowls are also engaged in farm
ing or other pursuits and it still comes
natural to them to slight the poultry
for what they consider greater interests
| (of course there are exceptions) and
consequently their success as poultry
men is. only fair. But whenever and
wherever the opportunity offered put
in good word for the faithful hen, and
| pleaded for a decent burial for her,
both as matter of right and of neces-
sity.
Here in Nashville, even, persons who
call themselves poultry fanciers throw
their dead fowls in the back alleys ant
fence corners, there to poison the all
and spread contagion-both among
their own and their neighbors' birds
I tell you it is wrong. 1t is shame
and anyone that does such thins
ought to be amenable to the law fol
such really criminal action. No mat
ter how careful and clearly person
may be about his own premises, if ont
of his flock happens to stray into thu
alley near by such a careless individ
ual it is liable to bring back the seed
of disease and death-being contam
mated by the poison from dead her
in the alley or fence corner.
What can we do, or what shall w
do to protect ourselvesp We mus
first be sure that our own skirts ar
clear, that no guilt lies at our owl
door. Then let every true fancie
urge his neighbor, who may keel
chickens in the old-fashioned, slip
shod way; urge him when one of then
dies from any cause whatever, to bur.
it and bury it deeply; to fumigate ant
whitewash his poultry quarters, t
kerosene the roosts and put blue-ston'
| in their drinking water And alst
urge him not to stop with the first eff
forts. but to make it practice to clear
out and polish up at least once week
and give his fowls half a chance fo
decent living. B. Geer, in 81. Loui
Poultry Record.